Looking to highlight its unique and sporty mindset, Mazda is getting ready to launch its biggest advertising campaign since "Zoom-Zoom" became its tagline in 2000. The new campaign, entitled "Game Changers," will begin in May, and rather than focusing on its sporty past – like it did with Zoom-Zoom early on – the new ads will look at recent advancements made in building its future, including Skyactiv technologies and its new diesel race program, both of which involve its excellent new Mazda6 sedan.

As a part of the ads, Mazda will showcase game changers from the sporting world, including **** Fosbury who changed how competitors perform the high jump and Laird Hamilton, who redefined how surfers attacked big waves. It doesn't sound like Zoom-Zoom is going away, but "Game Changers" will definitely feature heavily in the Japanese automaker's marketing moving forward.

NEW YORK, April 26, 2013 /PRNewswire/ -- Following the road less-traveled is something Mazda has been doing since it first came to the shores of the United States in 1970. Since then, Mazda has continued to push the envelope in design, engineering, and driving dynamics in order to make their vehicles stand apart from the rest. To better showcase Mazda's latest achievements, Mazda North American Operations (MNAO) today announced the launch of its new advertising campaign, dubbed "Game Changers," set to launch in May, 2013.

"This is the largest advertising campaign for Mazda in the last 13 years, but more importantly, it is the most far-reaching and significant campaign in our history. Game Changers will be the unifying advertising campaign to tell the story of Mazda's rich heritage in developing new and different ways to build outstanding vehicles, both for the immediate future and the launch of the 2014 Mazda6 sedan, but also to support the ongoing development of our strongest-ever product onslaught," said Russell Wager, vice president of marketing, MNAO.

Mazda's all-new Game Changers campaign will showcase various historical figures who have developed a new way to excel at their respective disciplines. Through courage, creativity and conviction, these individuals have defied convention and changed the "game" in which they "played'. Like these Game Changers, Mazda has examined the conventional way of building a vehicle, thrown away the directions and re-written the play book to develop not just a suite of environmental and dynamic technologies, but a philosophical thought behind manufacturing a vehicle that has erased the proverbial line between efficiency and driving dynamics.

Mazda will convey the new advertising message via in-cinema, television, print, out-of-home and digital media. True to form, Mazda is also looking at game-changing ways to reach consumers through motion-sensitive billboards and other new advertising landscapes.

"The Game Changers campaign will be a different approach to creative advertising from Mazda. Telling the story of Mazda's past and the historical things they have done, the Game Changers campaign uses similar ground-breaking stories from individuals in history who did things differently, which resulted in in them rising above their competition," said Harvey Marco, creative director, Garage Team Mazda.

The first advertising piece to jump into the marketplace will be that of the story of **** Fosbury. It is the 1968 Olympics and the setting is the Mexico City arena; Fosbury had been working on a new and unconventional approach to his talent, the high-jump. This stage would be the first time he would compete with his new way of getting over the bar, back-first. Fosbury went on to take home the gold in 1968, setting the new standard for high jump technique, the Fosbury Flop. Much like Fosbury, Mazda has been working to develop a new approach to automotive manufacturing, one that evaluates the process as a whole and has since flipped conventional automotive manufacturing upside down. SKYACTIV®[1] TECHNOLOGY has raised the bar in the automotive industry.

Since deploying SKYACTIV TECHNOLOGY, Mazda has changed the game, proving that it is possible to build a vehicle with excellent fuel efficiency, low emissions and stellar driving dynamics. The 2013 Mazda CX-5, the first vehicle to launch with the full suite of SKYACTIV TECHNOLOGY, showed consumers that the dichotomy of fun-to-drive and fuel efficiency could co-exist in a compact SUV. The all-new 2014 Mazda6 builds on that philosophy and redefined the sports sedan, again showing consumers that its outstanding fuel efficiency does not come with compromised driving dynamics.

Mazda's long-running Zoom-Zoom tagline will continue to be part of the brand's DNA. Since its inception in 2000, Zoom-Zoom has come to symbolize what a Mazda stands for – stylish, insightful and spirited – and the Game Changers campaign will take what the company built with Zoom-Zoom and allow it to better communicate the technology, style and driving dynamics of the next generation of Mazda vehicles.

Like a miniature, budget (and I don't mean that in a demeaning way) version of the Maserati Quattroporte--it has the same type of presence. It's absolutely gorgeous, especially given the modest segment it competes in.

I don't quite like it. In my opinion they should really try to go after Hyundai/Kia's marketshare. Appealing to enthusiasts, while it has been Mazda's operative for a while, won't really do much to increase their marketshare. They need to start getting a bigger slice of the pie if they want to move "upmarket" as they have said.